


heavy is the head that wears the crown

by yourlocalheartbreaker



Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Caring Spencer, Dad Hotch, David Rossi is a dad, F/M, Gen, Hotch Whump, Hotch and Garcia's friendship is underrated, Hotch deserved a proper backstory, Hurt Aaron Hotchner, Hurt/Comfort, I hurt Hotch a lot in this, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Past Child Abuse, Protective David Rossi, Protective Spencer Reid, Sad Hotch, Team as Family, i promise this has a happy ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-29
Updated: 2020-07-29
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:00:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,341
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25597681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yourlocalheartbreaker/pseuds/yourlocalheartbreaker
Summary: he’s supposed to be the leader of one of the most stressful teams in the fbi. he’s supposed to be the one the team turn to, the one who takes charge and makes the tough calls. he’s supposed to always maintain control. but he can’t always be strong. not when the threads holding him together are fraying more and more with every move he makes.(alternatively known as: six times hotch kept it together, and one he didn’t)
Relationships: Aaron Hotchner & David Rossi, Aaron Hotchner & Derek Morgan, Aaron Hotchner & Emily Prentiss, Aaron Hotchner & Jennifer "JJ" Jareau, Aaron Hotchner & Spencer Reid, Aaron Hotchner & The BAU Team, Aaron Hotchner/Haley Hotchner, Jason Gideon & Aaron Hotchner, Penelope Garcia & Aaron Hotchner
Comments: 34
Kudos: 227





	heavy is the head that wears the crown

**Author's Note:**

> warnings: depictions of child abuse, aftermath of abuse, canon-typical violence, references to self-harm (it’s not depicted, but hotch has some unhealthy thoughts in the hardwick scene), heavily implied sexual content

I  
He remembers the last time his father laid a hand on him perfectly. He remembers it perfectly because it was the most painful. When he was feeling particularly low, he wondered if his father knew he was going to die and wanted to watch his oldest son try and hold himself together as one small act of defiance. 

He remembers how each strike with the belt hurt more than the last. He remembers how he tried to keep his voice down, because Sean was sleeping, and he didn’t need to ever find out that their father was a bastard. He remembers that the pain became unbearable the moment his father pressed the still lit cigarette to the cuts and that he had screamed so loudly, he was scared the neighbours would come running. Remembers how his father had yanked his hair so hard more tears pooled in the corner of his eyes.

But they didn’t fall. Not when his father shoved him to the ground and left him to deal with his injuries himself. They didn’t fall then because he knew that for one more night, his mother and Sean would be safe from his touch. And that would have to be enough to keep him going.

They didn’t fall when the nice lady from reception asked to speak to him and told him how sorry she was but the hospital had phoned to say his father was dead after suffering a heart attack at work. He didn’t cry then because he was too busy thinking about how Sean was going to be destroyed. And his mother would likely retreat further into herself, leaving him to pick up the pieces and take over the home. 

He didn’t break at the funeral. Sean was clinging to his hand, tears streaming down his face, even as he didn’t understand why daddy wasn’t coming home. He wanted to fall to his knees and scream, because despite everything that man had done to him, he had never touched Sean, not even when he had been at boarding school and unable to protect him. But he didn’t, because neither he nor his brother had access to their inheritance, and they needed to survive. His mother wouldn’t work- and he wouldn’t want her to. But it meant it was up to him.

So he looked at himself in the mirror, put the mask that transformed him from Aaron, the delightful teenager who was in the theatre club, into Mr Hotchner, the man who could provide for his family and be who they needed him to be.  
It was almost too easy.

II

If he thought about it for too long, he would classify the whole incident with Vincent Perotta as his version of a breakdown. As the garrotte tightened around his neck, and as it became harder and harder to fill his lungs with the need to live, all he could think of was his father and Haley. His father smirking as his eldest son finally met the end he deserved- killed by someone he should have been able to defeat in the dark because he had gotten distracted- and Haley, home with a son barely old enough to hold his own head up.

Haley. 

The image of her holding their son gave him the strength to shove the unsub- he didn’t deserve to be named- away. And then the flashlights came into view and he knew he was safe. They had come to get him. He wasn’t alone. The relief was quickly overshadowed by the officer they still had to find, and the confession they still needed. He should have known Gideon would know why he had refused everyone’s offers of help. Why he hadn’t even loosened his tie. The ghost of his father saying he deserved the pain still haunted him.

He hadn’t wanted to finish it. He had wanted to stay as far away from that bastard as he could. But Jason Gideon never asked questions. He phrased demands as questions. So he put back on the Unit Chief mask and said sure. But he knew as soon as he said some that he had messed up. He just hoped nobody else would notice.  
The world had never been kind to him.

He didn’t know why he didn’t just walk out without responding. Why he chose to stand there and admit- or as close as he would ever get to admitting- that his father had abused him. That the shards of his words and actions still broke his skin and damaged his heart and filled his lungs with poison that he had to inhale. Maybe it was because he needed to remind himself. He was not his father, and he never would be.

Haley was awake when he got home. He felt bad, she needed all the rest she could get, but she had smiled, and said she loved him. It sounded like a reminder rather than a confession. He had managed to smile, gratefully getting in the bath she had run for him, scrubbing the hands of a murderer off of his skin.  
She made love to him that night. Took her time, brushing her lips over every bruise and scar. He had wanted all the lights off, still disgusted by the sight of his father on his body, but she had asked if having the lamp on the dimmest setting was okay, and he had said okay. She said she was so proud of him- was always so proud of him. And she didn’t laugh at the tears that fell after.

He wondered what Jason had said when he phoned, but he never asked.

III

After Reid killed Tobias Hankel, he kept it together. He had to. Because as clever as Spencer thought he was being, everyone knew he was keeping information from them. And Hotch wasn’t going to let him become the next Elle. He wasn’t going to let Gideon convince him everything was fine, because it wasn’t. And it wouldn’t be. Not for a while. Maybe not ever. But that wasn’t the priority. The priority was making sure Reid would be okay at the hospital. Then to get home. Then to give his statement. It wasn’t about making him better. It was about helping him get through each stage.

He didn’t break, because his team already hated him. Reid had called him a narcissist, and whilst he knew what was really being said, he couldn’t help but worry his youngest agent thought it was true. He knew Reid had initially believed what he had said to Phillip Dowd, but they had worked to move on from that. He thought they had. Maybe they hadn’t. Maybe Reid really did think Hotch viewed himself as better than everyone. If only he knew the truth.

Morgan had called him a drill sergeant, but he could handle that. Prentiss saying he trusted men more than women wasn’t hard to understand. He could argue that in her case, it was justified. But JJ calling him a bully without any hesitation had been like a knife to the heart. Worse than that. It had been like a small paper cut on each part of his body, so the pain would never fade. Not properly, because as soon as it stopped in one place, it started in another. He had tried so hard to love all of them. Especially her. She reminded him of Haley. Not because he was attracted to her- he wasn’t, no matter what rumours flew around- but because of her spirit. Her kindness. Her warmth towards everyone. Her willingness to trust. Her ability to be good, despite all she had seen.

Jason had been the only one to not say anything. But Hotch knew he would’ve had something to say. That was why he’d cut them off, started talking about an argument he had forgotten until then.

He didn’t break that night. Or the night after. He pulled away from the team, observing from a distance. He didn’t deserve to cry. Not when it was his fault Reid was struggling with  
a drug addiction he thought he was hiding. His fault JJ couldn’t even look at dogs without shaking.  
It was his fault. He would lock away his need to fall apart until he could look at them without guilt clouding his mind.

IV

Deep down, he knew he would be going back to an empty house after leaving for the case. Still, it was painful to see almost every trace of Haley and Jack gone. It hurt to look around the place they were meant to raise their son together and only see his own clothes and shoes. The plates Haley had picked because they were more fun than the set from her parents. The crib he had assembled before leaving. Jack had migrated to a bed, but they had just never gotten around to getting rid of it. The photos from the case that had ended everything.

He sat on their bed, head in his hands. At some point he started crying. For everything he had done wrong, for everything he was going to still screw up.

And then the phone rang. And Spencer was speaking too quickly for him to understand everything that had happened, but he managed to grasp the most important fact: Gideon was gone. He had left them. With nothing but a letter, addressed to Spencer, that he had left at the now cleared out cabin.

Despite the weariness stamped into his bones, he told Spencer to stay where he was. He drove to pick him up, took him back to his apartment. Said Haley would understand when he started to panic about taking him away from his wife. He rocked Spencer to sleep, singing the same lullabies he heard Haley sing to Jack when he wouldn’t stop shrieking. Noted there were no new marks on his arms and breathed a sigh of relief. He had to stop pulling away from Reid now Gideon was gone.

He couldn’t believe it. Well. He could believe Gideon leaving, always knew the day would come where he would decide he couldn’t do it anymore, and he had thought that day would be when Bale blew up six of their best agents, but when it didn’t happen then, he had dared to hope that it would never happen. He couldn’t believe Gideon had left the way he had. With only a goodbye to Spencer.

And he wanted to be mad at Spencer, because he was there and it would be so easy, but he looked at his sleeping figure, and knew he couldn’t. It wasn’t his fault. But he was mad at Gideon for only saying goodbye to Spencer. Because he had been the one to step up and become Unit Chief when Gideon was placed on leave. He had sacrificed his marriage and his life to make sure the team stayed together. Him. Not Morgan, definitely not Reid. Wasn’t he worth saying goodbye to? Had he really meant that little to Gideon?

For the next few weeks, everything served as a reminder. Reid quoting something or other reminded him of a book Gideon had recommended. A smile from a stranger in the street reminded him of Haley. The silence of a too big house reminded him of how he had failed. A comment about fallen agents made him think of Jason and Elle.  
He wanted to walk away as well. Beg Strauss for that transfer and go to Haley. Tell her he would do anything, if she would just come home. But his team- the team Gideon had already abandoned- were depending on him. They didn’t hate him now, but they would if he left as well. So he helped JJ with the requests, took interest in the languages Prentiss could speak, offered to listen to each and everyone of Reid’s lectures. He let Morgan take control every once in a while.

And if he became more Hotch than Aaron in doing so, then that was the price he would pay for not being better. 

V

Chester Hardwick was- for lack of a better term- an absolute shit show. Going into a cell with a dangerous serial killer and picking a fight with him had not been the plan. The initial plan had been to get in there, do the interview as quickly as possible, drive back to Quantico in silence- Reid never spoke on the return journey (he had never fully decided if he hated or loved that)- and ignore Haley’s demands for another night.

Then JJ phoned. And he knew she was trying to keep her tone professional, to not pass judgement on his soon-to-be ex-wife, but it was impossible to miss. Haley had clearly made it into a big deal that he hadn’t answered her calls. It angered him. He didn’t want to give up his son, or only be able to see him on the weekends because it wasn’t fair. He couldn’t guarantee he would even be available on the weekends, but he could guarantee to be there after a case.

Haley didn’t want to accept that. She didn’t want to amend the custody agreement. He didn’t want to go to court and have his faults brandished, but he didn’t want to back down. Which meant they were stuck. And she knew he would eventually be forced to give in and lose.

Again.

He told himself he needed to keep it together. He wouldn’t shout at Reid, not when he was still recovering from Hankel, from Gideon, from all the other bad things that had happened to him since then. And if he was being completely honest, he probably couldn’t shout at Reid, even if he needed to. For although he knew Spencer wasn’t the same innocent, uncoordinated mess that had joined his unit five years ago, he was still so good and kind. Hotch wouldn’t take that from him by shouting because he was frustrated at himself.

Instead, he provoked a dangerous serial killer. That had been one of the few things Haley had never gotten wrong about him: he never did things half-heartedly. 

So instead of asking questions to help understand why Hardwick had killed all those women, he shrugged his jacket off, loosened his tie (the memory of cold metal pressed against his neck still woke him even now) and raised his hands on a man who could very easily take any of the things in the room and kill him.

It was stupid. It was reckless. It was the kind of behaviour his father would beat him for, that Haley would shout at him for, and that Rossi would probably give him a round of applause and a drink.

But he was so angry at everything and everyone and he needed to relieve the tension but he couldn’t do it by going down the firing range and shooting a gun because it wasn’t the same. Maybe he was exactly like his father in that respect. Maybe it was the first step into becoming the monster he always knew he would be. It was unfair to say all abused children became abusers. It was fair to say profilers were just unsubs on the right side of the law. Sure, they did the right thing, but at the end of the day, they knew how serial killers and child abducters worked. Crossing the line wouldn’t be hard for any of them. 

He raised his fists at a serial killer because he needed to feel something under them. He needed to release the anger and sadness and guilt that flowed beneath his veins. Needed to see the blood on his fists from punching something too hard as a reminder he was human. And he knew that wasn’t healthy, but it was the truth. 

Something he had never been good with.

It was stupid. And he should have- could have, very easily- died.

But of course Reid saved him. Dr Spencer Reid, who was always rattling off statistics nobody understood, who had almost been sick at his first crime scene, who had teared up during his first solo interrogation, saved him. By playing to his strengths. He went on and on about the effects of abuse on a child, about the psychology behind finding release in murder, about what made someone into a serial killer.

He kept his audience of one captive for so long that the guards came and unlocked the door without Hardwick ever laying a hand on either of them. He managed to talk a serial killer out of murdering two federal agents. Hotch felt so proud. And disgusted with himself. Reid had talked long enough for the anger to evaporate into thin air and the shame to rain down on him like a storm.

What had he done? It wasn’t falling apart, because he knew what it was like when he fell apart, and that wasn’t it, but it was horrifying. Humiliating. He had put himself and his own issues above Reid’s safety.

He was every bit the narcissist Reid had once described him as being. The thought made him sick. Today it had been a serial killer, but how long before it became his team? Before it became his son?

He felt sick. But he forced himself to get behind the wheel, rejecting Reid’s offer to take over the driving for a little bit. He knew Reid hated driving. But when they had been on the road for a good twenty minutes, and the younger agent still hadn’t said anything about the journey back, or the sky, or the cars around them, he knew he had screwed up.  
Scratch that. He had fucked up.

Which was why he told Reid the truth. He hated speaking about his personal life, had always struggled with being open with others, especially the people he worked with because he was the Unit Chief and that meant he was supposed to be there as a strong presence that couldn’t be harmed, but Reid deserved to know why Hotch had been so willing to try and get himself killed.

“I am sorry. I shouldn’t have endangered you like that. It was wrong, and if you want to say something to Rossi or Strauss, I won’t stop you,” he said, after his confession that he  
couldn’t get what he wanted.

“I won’t say anything Hotch. You would never purposely disregard my safety. Even if you put yourself at risk, any harm that happened to me wouldn’t be deliberate. I know you kick better than a nine year old girl, and that you were holding back with Dowd because you didn’t want to hurt me too badly. And you didn’t,” Reid replied.

His throat went dry. “Hurt you too badly? As in, I did hurt you?”

The sudden fear he radiated made Reid pause. A bad move. Hotch was a damn good profiler, and whilst he always tried to follow the no inter-team profiling rule, some things were just too obvious to miss.

“I need to pull over,” he said.

Reid nodded, face pale and terrified. Luckily, he didn’t follow when he got out the car. And when he returned, Reid handed him a bottle of water and a mint. 

“There’s nothing to be ashamed of,” he had whispered after Hotch had begrudgingly taken both. 

“I hurt you,” Hotch replied. There was no point in trying to be the Unit Chief now. Reid had dismantled his shields by accident, and no suit or back-up weapon could prevent Aaron emerging and taking over from SSA Hotchner.

“But it wasn’t intentional then, and it wasn’t intentional with Hardwick. And you would never hurt Jack. Not in the way you think you may. I’m not saying you’re never going to  
make a mistake, you will, but you won’t hurt him the way your father did. You’re too good of a person to do it. I saw you holding Jack. The love in your eyes couldn’t be faked. And the way you rocked me to sleep after Gideon left was gentle and kind. You made a mistake with Hardwick. And that’s okay. You don’t have to be perfect. Not with us.”

Hotch stared at him. “I- how do you know about my father?” he asked, defences rising. The only members of the team who had known were Gideon who never followed the rules, and Dave, who had always had a soft spot for him.

Spencer flushed. “I didn’t profile you. We shared a room that one time, and the door to the bathroom wasn’t closed properly so I saw the scars. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have been looking.”

“It’s okay,” he said, because it had to be.

The younger man didn’t seem convinced. 

“Spencer.” The use of first names always drove points home. “It’s fine. I suppose everyone was going to work it out at one point or another. Thank you for not bringing it up then.”

When they pulled into the car park at Quantico, Reid did something very unexpected. He hugged Hotch. For a moment, he stood there, frozen because it had been so long since someone had done more than shake his hand that a hug felt so foreign, but then he regained control of his body and he bought his arms up and around him.

“Thank you Spencer,” he said.

“You once said to JJ that it’s okay if you lose it every once in a while. That it reminds us that we’re human. I think you should take your own advice.”

He nodded. But he didn’t.

He signed his divorce papers without contest. Haley was right: Jack deserved better than a father who could never confirm whether or not he would be there. He deserved better than a father who woke up in the middle of the night, and he definitely deserved better than a man who’s biggest fear was not that someone else would hurt their child, but that they would be the one to hurt them.

He signed the papers.

And then he got spectacularly drunk.

VI

He used to love New York. He had never worked there, but one of the few holidays he’d had with Haley that hadn’t been cut short was spent in New York. They’d never had a case there, which was why they were both so eager to go.

It had been so nice, to be in a city, and not remember an unsub who tortured women then left their bodies in ditches, or who had preyed on vulnerable children and then manipulated them into joining their twisted cults.

He had loved New York. 

And then Kate Joyner had died.

He wasn’t stupid, and his hearing wasn’t damaged when they first arrived. He heard JJ’s remark about her appearance and the tone in Emily’s voice when she had repeated his earlier statement that they had liased together.

It embarrassed him. If he had heard, then Kate definitely knew what they were saying. Not only did she have better hearing than he did, she was also pretty good at reading lips- a skill Hotch had learnt in SWAT and taught her for fun. And she had been staring at them, not him, when they spoke. It wasn’t going to be difficult for her to fill in the gaps.  
They hadn’t slept together. He had been happily married at that time, still affectionately calling Haley at every opportunity. And she hadn’t been interested in him like that. They had just been friends that worked well together. He had found it easy to open up to her, and she had liked him because his Southern upbringing meant he was nothing but a gentleman to her.

Then they were both blown up, only he walked away with nothing but a ringing ear and a breaking heart. She would never do anything ever again, and it was all his fault. Everyone he cared about either left or died- his mother, Haley, Kate and Sean.

“Look man, I’m not going to pretend you’re fine because I’ve called your name twice and you haven’t even raised an eyebrow so you’re going to pull over and I’m going to drive,” Morgan shouted.

Hotch slammed the brake far too hard, and turned, glowering at his subordinate. “I could’ve crashed the car then. You don’t need to yell.”

“Yes, I do. What is going on with your ear?”

“It’s nothing.”

Morgan looked at him, the disbelief clear, but eventually rolled his eyes and turned to stare out the window. Hotch took the hint and started driving.  
When they got back to Quantico, Rossi was tucked away in his office, and when Hotch looked through the paperwork he needed to fill in, he found half of it missing. JJ had left a note with her file saying she had moved his meeting with Strauss to next week. Garcia had left a batch of chocolate cupcakes with one of her many soft toys. Prentiss had already written her report, with no evidence of Reid’s input. Morgan appeared with his not too long after they returned. Reid offered to take the consults he had to do before he went home to an empty apartment. 

He accepted, the impossible smile making an appearance.

His team- no, his family- were always going to be there. He realised then that he could depend on them. That they wanted him to depend on him. Because they could all trust him with their lives, and everything they had done since landing had been to show him that they understood. That he wasn’t alone.

His joy lasted till the door to his apartment swung open, and he was greeted with the impersonal furniture, boxes he hadn’t had the time to unpack. The absence of a smiling blonde and excited little boy pretending to be a superhero.

Instead of breaking, he pulled out a file about a case involving missing women. They had all been pregnant, unmarried and blonde. He hadn’t wanted JJ to see it. So he worked on a profile late into the night, only putting the file away when he was pleased the police would be able to find the unsub.

He couldn’t protect his team from a lot, but this. This he could do. It was better than them realising he wasn’t worth baking for, wasn’t worth their attempts of comfort and walked away.

I

Haley was dead. She had been killed in the home they were supposed to raise their son in together, all because he had wanted to be a hero and refused to take the deal. The deal she had never found out about and would never find out about because Foyet had murdered her. It was stupid, but Hotch wondered what would have happened if he had taken the transfer. It wouldn’t have been this.

Foyet was dead. He had killed a man with nothing but his bare hands. He was worse than his father. He had killed a man who said they had surrendered because he was angry. And he knew Foyet would have never surrendered. He would’ve waited for Hotch to move away and then killed him, found Jack and made good on his promise. He knew that, logically, there was no other option.

It didn’t make him feel any less like a monster. That was part of the reason why he had sent Jack away as soon as possible. He didn’t want his son to see him covered in blood long enough for it to become a proper memory. Didn’t want his son to see it and start asking if his daddy had been hurt by a bad guy because he didn’t want to explain that this time, daddy had been the one to hurt the bad guy. He had hurt him so badly that he was never coming back.

And neither was mommy. 

The only real parent Jack had ever had was gone, and he didn’t know what to do. He had never prepared himself to have the conversation about death with Jack. It was morbid, but he had always assumed Haley would be the one explaining that sometimes bad things happen to good people, and because of that, dad wasn’t going to be coming home anymore, because he was going to go to heaven instead.

He’d never been particularly religious. But he wished he was. At least then he could believe himself when he finally told Jack that mommy had gone to heaven like some of the other kids’ grandparents.

Not for the first time, he wondered why he ever thought having kids was a good idea. He hadn’t wanted them at first. He hadn’t wanted to bring a child into the world when so many people were evil and malicious. Hadn’t wanted to put anyone else at risk of becoming the object of his anger. He didn’t want to repeat the actions of his father and become the monster in the closet he had always been terrified of.

Then he had met Haley, and she reminded him of the stars. For she brightened even the darkest moments, and he just knew that no matter what he became, if she had his children, they would shine like the brightest star, and they would never become irreparably damaged by his own paranoia and fear because she would be there for them.

Now she was gone. And it was all his fault.

But he managed to keep it together at work for his team, and at home for his son. 

Jessica had been a lifesaver, taking Jack out when Hotch needed a break, staying with them until Jack had settled into the apartment properly. She even dug up old albums and gave them to Hotch, saying that he deserved to have them. The two of them had grown closer, and he was happy for that, but he just wished it hadn’t taken the death of Haley to let them bond. Jack had nightmares about a loud bang, and sometimes he would wake up crying for his mother, but Hotch had already started looking into therapists for children, and he also sat with Jack, stroking his hair and reading him stories till he fell asleep.

He never told Jack he too had nightmares about lots of things, and sometimes he woke up in the middle of the night, terrified and wanting someone there to comfort him. Both Jessica and the bureau psychologist he was forced to see had told him to, but there was something- pride mainly- that prevented him from ever admitting to his son that he wasn’t okay.

At work, he compartmentalized as much as was humanly possible. The team were doing their best to cope, and he knew the only reason he’d been offered the option to take his retirement package or return, as opposed to being fired without any benefits, was because of the accounts they had given Strauss. Accounts that framed him as a man desperate to bring a killer to justice and protect his son, as opposed to a man who had become obsessed with one particular case that had hindered his ability to do his job.  
He never said thank you, because he knew they wouldn’t understand. In their eyes, he had been heroic. He had done what any of them would have. But Hotch knew he hadn’t. He knew his team. They were better people than he was, and they would never have killed a man who had surrendered, no matter how bad their crimes had been.

So although he wasn’t okay, he kept it together. He kept it together for as long as he could, and he ignored his own broken heart, ignored the constant replay of the final conversation he’d ever had with Haley and the sound of gunshots ringing out. He ignored the nightmares and the memories, the sick feeling that overwhelmed him every time he remembered that Foyet had won by destroying him and then moulding him into the person he’d sworn not to become.

He stayed strong because he had to be. But it was becoming harder everyday as the threads that held him together frayed with every scream from his son’s bedroom, every sympathetic smile Strauss gave him in meetings, every hand Jessica placed on his shoulder, every file his team tried to hide from him and pass to Rossi to sign off on instead.  
It was three months after that the thread finally snapped clean in half. He had thought he was getting better. Jack certainly was. His twice-weekly trips to the therapist were proving to be beneficial as he was sleeping through the night more often and finding it easier to talk about his mom, even if he didn’t fully understand what was going on. Jessica had gone back to work and was slowly moving through her own grief as she tried to honour the memory of her sister by sharing her memories with her son and ex-husband.  
Aaron thought he was doing the same, but maybe repressing and coping had become the same in his mind.

It was late, but Jack had gone to see his grandparents with Jessica and he didn’t fancy going home- not when the rest of his team were still there- so he got a coffee, ignored their concerned faces and started working on a consult he hadn’t got round to the previous day.

He dropped his mug the moment he opened the case file and saw who the victims were.

All blonde women. All divorcees. All of them had been the ones that filed, and all of them had filed because they felt neglected. All of them had been awarded custody of the child, without a court hearing. The police were stuck because they couldn’t find anyone in the local area who had been married to a blonde woman and had one young child.  
The sight of their bodies, mutilated and bloody, made him sick. The images blurred as he tried to blink away tears. Next to the photos of their dead bodies were the pictures of their faces, genuine smiles and sparkling eyes, blissfully unaware of the evil that was about to happen.

He didn’t hear the mug shatter into nothing as hot coffee went all over the wooden flooring. All he heard was a gunshot, then another and then a third, and Foyet taunting him, saying he would find Jack and show him the bodies of his dead parents. Maybe he screamed, maybe he couldn’t make a sound, but he couldn’t see anything properly as tears streamed down his face and made everything unfocused and fuzzy.

“-you hear me?” someone asked.

He blinked. Why was he on the floor? What had happened? He looked down, saw his knees pulled to his chest, hands clenched into fists at his sides.

“What?” he managed to say, voice hoarse.

“What’s wrong?” Rossi asked, kneeling beside him. 

He looked up, saw Spencer and JJ in the room, Emily and Morgan in the doorway, and Garcia behind them. 

“Nothing,” he lied. He was supposed their leader, the mom of the team- he had grown to accept that title. He couldn’t fall apart in front of them. “You’re going to hurt your knees if you sit like that for much longer.”

Rossi cursed in Italian. “Kiddo, I don’t care. I want to know what’s going on with you. You’ve been pretending to be strong for these past few months, and we know how much you hate anyone interfering with your personal life, but if you’re hurting, you need to let me help.”

“It’s nothing,” he repeated.

JJ picked up the file, opened it without a word. “Oh, Hotch. Why didn’t you let one of the others deal with it?”

There was such sadness in her eyes, he couldn’t look at them. “Because I can handle it.”

The sound of Reid’s cane coming closer gave him something else to focus on. “Hey Hotch,” he greeted gently. “Do you want to know something? After Hankel, I found it almost impossible to deal with consults involving someone who was using drugs, either on themselves or the victims. I had to try and pass the files off to Morgan and Prentiss. I can do them now, but it still hurts. So it’s okay.”

“No it’s not,” he said. “It’s not because it’s my fault she’s dead. If I hadn’t rejected the deal, all those people on the bus would still be alive, Haley would be here and Jack would have a real parent, who could be there and comfort him, instead of a failure of a father who can’t guarantee to keep him safe and who wakes up shouting in the middle of the night.” He didn’t know why he suddenly opened up, but Reid just had that effect on people sometimes.

Reid blanched. Rossi pulled away, shock all over his face. Garcia pushed her way into the room, heels louder than Reid’s cane and threw her arms around Hotch in a tight hug. He felt the sleeve of his shirt start to get wet, and it was only then that he realised Garcia was crying.

“It is not your fault that Haley died. It is Foyet’s. He killed her, and you had no control over his actions. You did the right thing by not taking the deal, and don’t you ever think otherwise. You are a real parent. You’re a parent to almost everyone on this team, and you’re a wonderful father to Jack. Stop beating yourself up. You’ll never be able to protect him from everything, but that doesn’t mean you’re not good. You are the best man I know, and I know some pretty great people. So dry those eyes, and let us help you,” she said, determined.

He stared at her for a few moments.

“Sir,” she added hesitantly.

“Do you honestly believe that?” he asked, more tears threatening to spill.

Garcia nodded.

Morgan crept closer. “I know what it’s like to grow up with a dad. And Jack will never have to go through that, because even if you’re not there in person, you’re there emotionally. He won’t remember missed soccer games or forgotten parent-teacher conferences. He’ll remember how you read to him, how you always listened.”

“My father turned up to everything I ever did. But it never felt like he cared. It felt like he was just trying to keep my mother happy. When you go to Jack’s things, he knows you’re there because you love him, and that is all any child wants,” Emily added.

“You’re more of a father than my own dad ever was,” Reid declared.

“Hotch, you were the one that taught me that this job doesn’t have to take everything away from us. That we can still form meaningful relationships with others. You never doubt my choices, you just make sure I’m able to back them up, and you’re the reason I don’t go home fretting about whether or not I made the right call,” JJ said, tucking the file away.

“Aaron, I never got to meet my son. But every time I see you smile, every time I see you handcuff another unsub, or speak to a victim, I am reminded that family is not just blood. You’ve been strong for far too long. Let yourself fall and trust us to catch you,” Rossi finally spoke.

“I just couldn’t believe she was gone. And then I saw the photos, and I realised it must have been like that for someone else when she died and it finally hit me and I just couldn’t, but I thought I was moving on and-“ he couldn’t speak, the words not able to push past the lump in his throat as the emotions finally overwhelmed him and the soft cries became mournful sobs that eventually calmed into sniffles.

Rossi and Garcia never stopped hugging him. Reid kept his hand on his shoulder. JJ smoothed his hair, singing the same lullabies that Henry heard every night before he slept. Morgan and Prentiss stood to the side, having locked the door and closed the blinds.

Once he had enough awareness to realise what he had done, he tensed and waited for the hit. It never came. What came instead was a series of encouraging smiles, the option to talk, or just sit in silence. The promise to never leave. To always be there when he needed them.

“Thank you,” he whispered.

“You’re our family Hotch. We’re not going to let you suffer,” Morgan said.

Everyone nodded.

It wasn’t easy, falling apart. Especially not in front of your colleagues. But Morgan was right, they were a family. So Hotch finally let himself fall, finally let himself feel all the grief he had been burying for so long, and for once in his life, he let someone else catch him. He let them in. He accepted their support, however long it took for him to actually do so was irrelevant. He let himself cry, and he let his family dry his tears.

They wouldn’t leave him. Not now. Not ever.

But soon, he would be saying goodbye to JJ, wondering how they were going to survive without her. He would be faking Emily’s death, then fleeing because he was a coward who couldn’t bear to see their grief-stricken faces. He would be forced to confront his own actions, reveal the deadly secret that had been slowly killing him. He would damage the trust that had taken so long to build, damage the friendship he had with Morgan, potentially ruin the friendship between Reid and JJ.

He would be crying himself to sleep. Having nightmares that stopped him from doing that for more than a few moments.

And then Garcia would find him rocking himself in his office, whispering I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, to himself. She would drop her request for advanced technology, and once again wrap her arms around him. She would tell him that he did the right thing, that in time, everyone would forgive him, would trust him again. He would look at her, and her heart would break, because her boss should never look that pale and broken, and ask if she was sure.

She wouldn’t be able to answer for a moment. And then she would say she forgives him. And that it was okay.

The next day, Morgan would ask him to check a file. Reid would tell him about the stars. Garcia would bring him a slice of pie. Rossi wouldn’t make any comments that undermined his authority or showed a lack of trust. Prentiss would call him Hotch again, instead of sir. He would invite them for dinner, and they would all accept.  
He would confess that keeping the secret had broken him, and they would all forgive him. He would finally let himself cry, let them put him back together. And they would decide to have a very dodgy sleepover- Garcia’s suggestion- because Jack wanted to see Henry, and who could ever say no to his requests.

And that night, Spencer Reid would phone his sponsor, not because he was scared of using, but because he didn’t want to.

Jennifer Jareau would snuggle up to William LaMontagne Jr instead of pulling away from him like she had the past few months.

Derek Morgan would not blame himself for everything that had gone wrong that day.

David Rossi would not curse the God he believed in, he would thank Him for bringing Emily back safely, and for granting Aaron peace.

Emily Prentiss would sleep without a knot in her stomach, for she would finally be sure her family would be okay.

And Aaron Hotchner would watch his family with a smile, before he finally fell asleep as well, not a single tear needed to exhaust himself. He would be a little more whole, once again sure the people around him did truly love him. And he would remember his wife, just before he fell asleep, and it wouldn’t hurt, because he was happy.

**Author's Note:**

> please be kind, this is the first criminal minds fanfic i've written, and the first fanfic i've published since i'm twelve. also if anything they say is innacurate, i'm british and sometimes don't remember the american words for things, i'm sorry!! also, that whole thing after emily comes back was a) supposed to be a proper scene but i just couldn't and b) supposed to be part of a separate hotch x ofc fic set when rossi came back, but i'm scared to write it. 
> 
> also, i have a really inactive tumblr! it's yourlocalheartbreaker. 
> 
> thank you for reading xxx


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